 New moderator blasts Confessing Movement By Robert P. Mills The Presbyterian Layman Volume 34, Number 5 Posted July 6, 2001
Rogers received 286 votes, 55 percent. He was trailed by Nancy Maffett with 125 votes, Andy Sale with 67 and Sandra Hawley with 46. Immediately following his election, he was escorted to the platform by former Moderator Freda Gardner. CCM ‘a threat’ During the question and answer session immediately preceding the vote, Ted Wardlaw, minister commissioner from Atlanta Presbytery, asked the four candidates, “What is your response to the Confessing Church Movement?” Rogers answered, “It just happens that I was teaching a class on the Reformed confessions this spring. I was preparing to teach on the Barmen Declaration when the Confessing Church Movement was announced. So I looked at that history again [and] I have to say to you with great sadness that there is virtually no similarity between what is being called the Confessing Church Movement in this denomination and the Confessing Church Movement to which they refer.” His assertion was greeted with a burst of applause. Rogers continued, “I’m very grieved by this movement. We have a wonderful Book of Confessions. For any group to pick out three things that they think are important and then say all the rest of us have got to say that these are the most important, that demeans our confessions. We have a wonderfully representative church government. This movement disregards that and says ‘We’re going to tell you what the personnel policies are going to be for the church.’ That disregards our Presbyterian form of government. I’m deeply concerned about this and I think we need to take it very seriously as a threat to the peace, unity and purity of the church.” Rogers has been a prominent supporter of the Covenant Network, which has formed its own network of churches as a step toward achieving its goal of removing G-6.0106b, the “fidelity and chastity” ordination standard, from the PCUSA constitution. Confessing Jesus as Lord At a press conference, Rogers was asked about evangelical support for the Confessing Church movement. He replied, “I don’t think the Confessing Church Movement represents evangelicals. I think it represents just one very tiny group within the evangelical community of the Presbyterian Church. And I think if the truth were known, a lot of other evangelicals are embarrassed by it. I do not think it is helpful to the church.” Asked how confessing Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior is a threat to the church, Rogers replied, “The issue is not the affirmations. The issue is the implications that are being attached to them … is that I’m supposed to be condemning of everybody who says good things about people of other religions. I don’t accept the implications of that.” Of the authority of Scripture Rogers said, “I do not accept the implication that you can just pick verses out of Scripture and say ‘This is the clear word of God and nobody can argue with it.’ That’s not a responsible way to exegete Scripture, and a lot of that is being done. That’s an implication of the Confessing Church Movement, that we have to agree with their interpretation of Scripture. And I don’t think we do.” ‘No one can be ordained’ Rogers then was asked, “How in the world can the Presbyterian Church get back on track and get the confessions in their proper historical perspective?” He answered, “First we have to be honest about what is happening. The final sentence of G.6-0106b means that no one in this church can be ordained. Because it says that if anyone practices something the confessions call sin, they can’t be ordained. There are 250 sins in there and everybody in this room commits many of them because we no longer think they are sins. Usury is one.” Speaking of the majority of General Assembly and presbytery commissioners who voted to put G-6.0106b in the Book of Order and keep it there Rogers said, “The people who did that didn’t really know what the confessions said. It sounded good. I think what they meant was that nobody should do what they thought was sinful. And they just assumed the confessions thought like they did.” |
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